Thinking About Thinking: Why you should talk to yourself (or keep it up if you do already)

It’s actually really simple: We remember things we perceive. We also remember things we think.

When you say something to yourself, you’re simultaneously thinking it and perceiving it – so you’re more likely to remember it. Ditto with writing it down or typing it out on something, even if you never happen to read whatever you wrote again.

And it doesn’t have to be socially awkward, either – if you’re in a place where it would be inappropriate to talk to yourself, you can (and probably do) resort to imagining that you are talking to yourself. Of course, you generally don’t have to resort to imagining you’re writing something down, as generally writing something down doesn’t seem as creepy as someone just mumbling to nobody, so that can work too.

Now, if you find you need to talk to yourself to remember things on a regular basis, that might be a problem – one with your memory. It might merit talking to a professional about it (frankly, though, memory isn’t all too well-understood, so you might not be able to get anything from it). It might also be worth a diary.